Why Gandhi is MAHATMA

“LIVES OF GREAT MEN ALL REMIND US

WE CAN MAKE OUR LIVES SUBLIME,

AND, DEPARTING, LEAVE BEHIND US

FOOTPRINTS ON THE SANDS OF TIME.”

     According to the Indian mythology, whenever suppression, oppression or despotism to the society or nation reaches its peak and cruel powers rule over the people, the God himself descend to the earth to save the people & humanity from this. Likewise when India saw the zenith of oppression by the British, it was about the see the new era of Indian Freedom Struggle Movement & that marked the emergence of the great Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. He not only led the freedom struggle movement of India, but also showed a new path for it. He was a great nationalist, lawyer, philosopher, freedom fighter, micro economist & social reformist at the same time. His great contributions for the freedom & reformation of India have given him the title ‘Father of the Nation’.

Everybody knows about the biography of Mahatma Gandhi. Let’s study different aspects of his life & his vision for a strong nation for which he is regarded as MAHATMA.

GANDHI AS A FREEDOM FIGHTER:

     Every Indian since his early childhood knows that Mahatma Gandhi was the path shower & leader of the freedom struggle movement of India. Gandhiji stayed in UK & South Africa for a significant time in his life. Finally he came back to India in 1915. By then, he was well aware about the domination & cruelties of the British Government in India. He travelled across the country to understand the real conditions in which the Indians were living. He noticed the oppression of the British government on the poor peasants & farmers. His first significant contribution for the Indian people can be considered to be the Champaran movement in 1917. He fought for the Indigo peasants in the Champaran district of Bihar and gave their rights to them. He also launched a signature campaign to unite the farmers against the British government for relaxation in tax payment. He took the leadership of Congress in 1920 and started revolting against the policies of the British government. He led the NON-COOPERATION MOVEMENT in 1921, /Salt Satyagraha or CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE MOVEMENT in 1930 & QUIT INDIA MOVEMENT in 1942 which were quite significant landmarks in the freedom struggle movement. Moreover he also opposed the Rowlatt Act passed by the British government and tried to unite the Hindus & Muslims. He knew very well that unless all the Indians irrespective of the religion & caste are united, we cannot attain freedom. Also he gave two most powerful weapons to the Indians to fight against the British government i.e. Truth & Non-violence.

GANDHI AS A MICRO ECONOMIST:

     Everyone knows Gandhi to be a freedom fighter and his contributions in the freedom struggle movement. But apart from, he has many more contributions for the country that we largely ignore. He always dreamt of a Self-reliant India that would be quite helpful to make India strong. It can also save the people to work under the domination of the British government. He always opined that one should do his work & fulfill his requirements himself. He adopted the Indian Dhoti, hand woven Shawl etc as his cloth and used the Indian spinning wheel i.e. CHARKHA. He himself used to spin the wheel everyday to make the clothes. He always lived in a self-sufficient residential community to represent the poor & common mass of India. He always focused on the development of micro-economy units so that every poor citizen of the nation can be self-reliant and the India economy would be stronger. Gandhi believed in SARVODAYA model which means uplifting of all, especially the downtrodden section of the society as he wanted to lessen the big gap between the rich & the poor.

GANDHI AS A SOCIAL REFORMIST:

     Mahatma Gandhi was amongst the handful of the people who brought about many social reforms in the Indian society, especially in the 20th century. He noticed that the Dalits & Untouchables in the Indian society are highly ignored & oppressed; not only by the British government, but also by the upper caste Indians themselves. He fought to give equal rights & justice to them besides the fight for omission of untouchability. He cited the untouchables & dalits to be HARIJANS which means that they are the people of God. He travelled across the country to inspire people to accept the Harijans as important part of the society. He also appealed the Indians to give up many bad habits, superstitions and motivated people towards maintaining sanitation & cleanliness around them. He was also quite active in providing service to the leprosy patients. He also advocated the participation of women in nation building and in providing equal opportunities to them in all spheres of life. He opposed Purdah system, Child marriage & Dowry system prevailing in the society. All these activities of MK Gandhi make him a great social activist as well as social reformist. During his stay in South Africa, he had also fought against the domination of the British government for oppressing the black people there.

GANDHI AS A WORSHIPER OF TRUTH & NON-VIOLENCE:

     The most prominent weapons that were quite handy during the freedom struggle movement of India were truth & nonviolence. Gandhiji inspired all the Indians to adopt this as he understood very well that these two are even more powerful than any kind of weapons used for domination or suppression. He called his movement Satyagraha which means reliance on truth. He based the Satyagraha on the concept of Ahimsa or non-violence & universal love.  Gandhi explains his philosophy & ideas about truth & nonviolence in his book ‘MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH’. Both the weapons helped us to get freedom in 1947.

GANDHI AS A HINDU NATIONALIST:

     Many critics cite MK Gandhi to be a Hindu nationalist. Gandhi opposed the missionary organizations that criticized the Indian religions & attempted to convert the followers of Indian religions into Christianity or Islam. He said that people who demand religious respect must also show the same respect to the followers of other religions. Gandhi was a great believer & follower of Hindutwa and he always inspired others to follow this as it teaches us the way to live an ideal life without hurting others. He was a great believer of BASUDHAIBA KUTUMBAKAM.

     Gandhi’s contribution towards the Indian society in many aspects can never be ignored. He loved everyone & everyone loved him. He was an advocate of Integral Humanism. Gandhi influenced many political leaders of the next generation and led a number of agitations himself by uniting the entire nation. Apart from India, we can find a number of his followers like Nelson Mandela of South Africa, Martin Luther King of USA, Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan and many others. Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore was the man who gave the title of ‘MAHATMA’ to him for his great contributions for the entire human society. I pay my tributes from the deepest part of heart on his birth anniversary and appeal all the people of the entire world to understand his philosophy and live a prosperous life by following him.

Ritesh Ranjan Meher